


Imperfect Resolution

by Nny11



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Ahsoka Tano Needs a Hug, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Barriss Offee Needs a Hug, Barriss joins the Rebellion, Bury The Hatchet, Complicated Relationships, Depression, F/F, Flashbacks, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Burnout, Forgiveness, Forgiveness is Complicated, Healing isn't linear, Memory Magic, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Episode: s02e21-22 Twilight of the Apprentice, The Force Ships It, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, aliens now have more alien features, authorial power: UNLIMITED POOOOOW-WAAAAAAH, cw: blood (minor), cw: cursing, cw: vomit (minor), ex-girl friends, made up a planet to make my characters miserable, memory sharing, rebuilding relationships, sharing a shuttle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-09
Updated: 2019-08-09
Packaged: 2020-08-13 19:06:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20179228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nny11/pseuds/Nny11
Summary: When Ahsoka Tano heard there was a possible Jedi living in the Outer Rim she could recruit, she didn't expect to find Barriss Offee. She didn't expect her stupid heart to bleed over this. It's so much easier to forgive someone when you thought they were dead.





	Imperfect Resolution

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AriesOnMars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AriesOnMars/gifts).

> Huge shout out to [BookwormGirl16](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BookwormGirl16/pseuds/BookwormGirl16) and [Gabby (Kirahsoka)](rel=) for helping me out over the last TWO FLIPPING YEARS as I struggled to make this fic both exist and then nominally enjoyable to read. You were both great sounding boards, brain stormers, plot thickeners, and character developers!
> 
> This was inspired by a fic request from [AriesOnMars](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AriesOnMars), but I saw the request years ago and foolishly didn't save the link. So I can't submit through whatever exchange I found that on. :| Sorry for coming late to the party Aries, but at least I didn't come empty handed! I also maybe sort of combined both ideas and in the process kinda failed them both, so here we are. (original prompts in end notes)

For a moment the whole galaxy stops.

Ahsoka’s eyes are glued to the screen of her datapad watching the small moving figure of a woman slip past an Imperial check stop. The footage is grainy, shudders, and has no sound but those facts no longer matter. The woman was careful not to draw attention to herself, and worked hard to look like she’d passed through the ident scan like everyone around her. Her head was up, hands folded neatly in front of herself allowing her small bag of groceries to bounce on her arm. She should have looked like any millions of beings. Like anyone else. But Ahsoka would never be able to forget that face. Her eyes traced over the tattoos on her cheeks, counting them slowly in case more had been added. There weren’t. 

_ It’s the same, the same, the same. _

Barriss Offee looks absolutely calm as she walks into the crowd and out of the camera’s view.

Ahsoka can’t breath. Her heart is beating in her throat and she can feel the way she’s trembling in her seat. Her vision starts to blur, tunneling down to focus only on the feed, burning through the spot that Barriss passed through.

She isn’t sure if she’s terrified or furious.

Barriss is alive. After all these years, all the good people who have died, all the Jedi who were slaughtered, the children turned, and the clones driven mad-Barriss Offee is somehow alive. The Temple long since burned to the ground- and her lead on a potential Jedi has lead her to a murderer. Ahsoka barks out an incredulous laugh, one hand shooting to cover her mouth. To smother the sound as if there was anyone else on board her shuttle. How fitting that in this hellish galaxy, with all the potential that any Jedi would offer to the Rebellion, that she finds the first person to strike them down. The first traitor.

Ahsoka folds herself up, taking as little space as possible on her chair and takes a deep breath. She appreciates the way her lungs burn and her throat stings before letting it out in a slow hiss. Then she plays the clip again.

Barriss is alive.

The longer she watches the looping footage the more sure she is of her own emotional reaction. 

The galaxy tips on its side and her stomach turns in protest before the warmth fully blooms in her chest. 

Ahsoka is so very, very grateful that Barriss is still alive.

She’s going to make contact. She has to.

* * *

Frigore is a terrible planet. It’s cold and damp, with snapping winds and driving rain. Ahsoka had barely lowered her ship’s ramp before getting hit with a sheet of near freezing water. It was miserable by any standards, but even as she shivered away tucked under the protective awning of a shop, Ahsoka has to admit it was particularly miserable by Barriss’s standards. Barriss hated being cold, detested damp clothing, and seemed to have a particular vendetta against mud.

_ “At least you evolved for this,” Ahsoka whined as she pulled her poncho tighter around her. “I should be on a warm planet thank you, a grassland preferably!” _

_ Barriss’s eyes fluttered shut with frustration while she rubbed the bridge of her nose. “For the last time, I didn’t grow up on Mirial, and I did the last two runs. It’s your turn!” _

_ Ahsoka gave it one last, desperate shot, turning on her brightest smile “Barriss don’t you love me?” _

_ Ahsoka squawked with indignation as Barriss physically shoved her out the door with a laugh. _

“You can’t hear or something lady? Buy something or move along!” The shop owner’s gravelly voice pulls her back to the present. Ahsoka gives an apologetic smile before pulling her boots out of the mud and leaving.

At least this time she is better prepared with a very warm and waterproof jacket. Still, she really isn’t designed for cold and wet. One or the other doesn’t bother her, it’s the insidious nature of the combination that makes her skin crawl. Everything itches when it’s wet and the cold leaves everything muffled. Stepping back into the main thoroughfare sends her ability to traverse the world into a tizzy. The freezing wind sends constant fake signals to her. It feels like she should be going down a flight of stairs with each step. The water pelting her montrals doesn’t help. It doesn’t  **do** anything in particular, it’s just cold and wet, and it kinda feels like she has melting ice cubes on her head. Ahsoka revisits her idea of “better prepared”. At least little her always wore a hood and usually had goggles for inclement weather. Although she has to concede that was normally thanks to Master Obi-Wan or Anakin fussing over her.

Once Ahsoka starts to feel too dizzy again she ducks into a small alley that’s at least more protected than the street. 

“What am I doing here?” Ahsoka whispers to herself, teeth chattering. She’s not sure Barriss will be a good agent for the Rebellion, but it’s not really her choice. At least not  **only** her choice, even if her mind is made up the others have a say. Ahsoka is acting like a petulant youngling and wasting time in the hopes that if she’s doing the bare minimum of looking it’ll still count for something. Her aimless wandering is uncomfortable, ineffective, and dangerous.

_ “Barriss wait! We’re going to be separated, comm dark, and somehow magically syncing our movements? That’s not gonna work and you know it!” Ahsoka doesn’t let Barriss pull her elbow back. “I’m serious, we need to figure out a way to communicate or this plan will fail.” _

_ Barriss glares at her and it feels a bit like getting slapped. _

_ Ahsoka doesn’t know what she  _ ** _did_ ** _ but she hates past her for it. Barriss had suddenly stopped taking comm calls from her, refused to answer messages, and had even out right ignored text messages. It had been so shocking that Ahsoka had reached out to Master Luminara to make sure Barriss wasn’t dying in a medcenter somewhere. That was probably the fatal mistake that had gotten the two of them assigned together for a solo mission, and Ahsoka had been greeted by a slender mirialan-shaped ice cube masquerading as her friend. _

_ Barriss doesn’t let stupid things get to her, so Ahsoka knows it’s something she’s done and she accepted the punishment for it. She’d even tried to reflect on what she’d done, spending her free time meditating on the problem without prompting, and came up with nothing. She’d been resigned to leaving Barriss alone until now. _

_ Now it was life and death, now it was about their mission. _

_ “Barriss, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I did, and I am sorry I hurt you, but right now? That doesn’t matter. Whatever it was isn’t as important as this!” Ahsoka searches her face, focused on anything that could give away what Barriss was thinking. _

_ The facade cracks for a moment and the guilt is so palpable that Ahsoka immediately pulls her friend in for a hug. _

_ Barriss freezes before clutching at Ahsoka’s arms, not pushing her away, just clinging as if she’d be swept away otherwise. _

Ahsoka moans into her hands and roughly scrubs at her face as the flashback fades away. She’s been having these little flashes and trips down memory lane with increasing frequency since landing; the Force getting pushier and louder the further she’d gone. This whole mission is already a cluster from her emotions and she’s going to fail if she doesn’t shape up. Of course the Force is being nosey and reminding her to be mission focused. Great. Ahsoka knows she needs to search the Force for Barriss. She knows that. It’s just...it was so much easier to understand and even somewhat forgive her when Barriss was just another ghost from her past. The tattered remains of their bond is still there. Ahsoka knows she could find her much more easily if she just uses it.

It’s intimate though. It implies a closeness between them that hasn’t existed in over a decade.

It’s also her only real source of information, unless she wants to spend more time carefully trying to not take a header and knock herself out. Ahsoka snorts as the headline flashes through her mind. ‘Former Jedi and Rebel Leader Ahsoka Tano Captured via Green Wind Energy!’

The bond shivers in her mind and Ahsoka freezes. Just by looking at it- just by acknowledging it she’s set something in motion. But...but that’s not quite right is it? The faint plucking is soft and unsure, and not because of anything Ahsoka is doing at all. That doesn’t make sense-

_ Barriss smiles at her, and tentatively pulls on their new bond. There’s a few fleeting feelings that warm Ahsoka from the tips of her horns to the tips of her toes. Excitement and happiness nearly eclipse the sense of longing. Or maybe she sent that? Ahsoka giggles as she presses their foreheads together, and lets herself fall into Barriss’s eyes. _

_ “You are such a sop!” Barriss whispers, but she’s smiling all the same and holding her hands and Ahsoka really doesn’t care right now. _

_ Still, she mumbles, “Like you’re any better!” _

_ Barriss laughs and Ahsoka can see her laughing as a youngling, an initiate, as she is. They fall together through a cool pane of glass and into a warm afternoon long past. Barriss sits quietly, reading from her datapad with her legs tucked up under her. The grassy floor ripples out from under her body as Ahsoka watches. She remembers this, well not the water like grass, but this was the moment Ahsoka remembers realizing how beautiful Barriss was. The room of a thousand fountains fades away, down to that one stream of light, down to the moment Barriss looked up at her with that sweet confused smile. _

Ahsoka remembers to breathe, gasping slightly as she leans on the wall. What in the universe? Her head throbs as someone enters the alley, she can hear their heartbeat speeding up and the bond sings with warm lights. Mending itself. 

Fear runs through her like ice water and is chased by a soothing touch.

_ “It’s dangerous.” Barriss’s voice is raspy and thin as she grabs Ahsoka’s face. “This is dangerous.” _

_ Ahsoka’s heart kicks into double time and she fights down all the hurt that sentence brings. “I trust you.” _

_ “Should you? Should you really?” _

_ “Of course!” _

Barriss hasn’t changed so much. Not really. She looks almost the same. Ahsoka notes with concern that the biggest change is how thin she is now. Barriss was always slight and the missing weight seems painfully obvious in person. It leaves her features so much sharper looking than the little blue feed implied.

Ahsoka swallows thickly, her fingers flexing against the wall as she tries to figure out what to say. What to do.

Barriss stares at her wide eyed, one hand clutching her shawl tightly around her shoulders and the other half lifted towards her. Barriss doesn’t speak, but her lips move all the same and Ahsoka can hear her name softly through the bond.

Barriss is alive and she’s here.

For all that her mixed up emotions and stupid heart told her to come here, Ahsoka finds herself stumbling backwards a half step when Barriss starts to walk forward.

_ “I’m not afraid of that,” Ahsoka whimpers, fighting off a wave of tears. She’s an idiot. She’s just as stupid and childish as everyone thinks she is! She knew better. _

_ Barriss seems shocked, her eyes widening before narrowing in concentration. _

_ “I,” Ahsoka hesitates only for a moment, “I don’t want to lose you Barriss. If this is what you want I can back off, but we can still be friends.” _

_ There’s hot and cold and prickling sensations up and down her spine, leaving her fingers numb and her chest full of cotton balls. It’s hard to know whose heartbreak it is. _

_ Barriss doesn’t keep her gaze as she mutters, “I know.” _

_ It doesn’t sound like much of an agreement. _

Ahsoka snaps back and finds herself sitting in the mud, the water seeping into the seat of her pants and into her boots. For once it’s not the wet cold that catches her attention, it’s the warmth of Barriss’s hand on her cheek. When her vision clears she’s staring right into Barriss’s watering eyes.

“Steady now, let’s get out of this rain.” Her voice is exactly the same.

Ahsoka feels like she’s sixteen again, seeing Barriss after a long mission on the front. Her voice is soft and lilting, it’s like hearing music. She flushes about twenty shades and can feel the way her lekku shudder in complete embarrassment. With their bond rebuilding, well, with Barriss rebuilding her nearly severed end Ahsoka is beyond an open book. 

There’s a wave of answering hope before it drowns in under a tidal wave of guilt. It makes her feel a little better to not be the only one accidently blasting her emotions everywhere. Ahsoka knows it will wear off, once the bond is reformed the unintentional sharing will stop. They won’t be able to share anything if they aren’t touching. Well, at least nothing that isn’t life and death important.

Barriss takes her hands and starts to pull her up. The continued contact triggering Ahsoka to remember-

_ Ahsoka is curled up around Barriss’s back, one arm trapped under a head of black hair and the other wrapped comfortably around her middle. Unlike her (girlfriend? friend? partner?), Ahsoka can’t actually sleep for more than about two hours at a time. She doesn’t mind laying in bed with her though. She knows that it’s greedy and dangerous, but she soaks up these moments. The time not wasted as Barriss’s dreams wash between them. Each time a nightmare starts to pull, Ahsoka can banish it. She conjures sleepy afternoons in the archives, mornings spent sneaking into the east spire to watch the sunrise, evenings spent holding hands and just being together. _

_ She wishes she could reach an appropriate place to leave a kiss, Ahsoka’s still not completely sure what she’s allowed to do with Barriss’s head and hair besides desperately trying to not drool on it when she does sleep… _

This time she catches Barriss who froze and started to tilt dangerously. Strange, she feels fine this time. Oh.  **Oh.**

“Were you...were you using memories to find me?” Ahsoka asks and from the way Barriss suddenly seems interested in her jacket, she knows why she’s been so disoriented. Of course the tidal wave of icy hot embarrassment doesn’t hurt in her ability to form that particular assessment.

Except...that should be impossible. Barriss shouldn’t be able to reform a broken bond just by conjuring memories, and Ahsoka shouldn’t be getting dragged along for the ride.

“I never broke the bond, despite- and I...when you landed I felt-” Barriss pauses, chewing on her lower lip for a moment before a particularly hellish gust of air hits them.

Ahsoka shivers, teeth chattering once more. “Oh fuck me! You said there’s an inside? Let’s go there, I love inside!”

Barriss laughs, a single large cloud of white billowing from her mouth.

_ “Aren’t you supposed to be the responsible, older one?” Ahsoka asks. _

_ Barriss glares over her glass but the effect is ruined by her wide grin. “I  _ ** _am_ ** _ being responsible. We, we didn’t go anywhere. Perfectly safe. Here. That’s responsible!” _

_ Ahsoka snorts into her own drink. “You are such a lightweight!” _

_ “I am not!” Barriss says, gasping with indignation before bursting into giggles. “Maybe a little.” _

_ “Kriff that’s cute.” Ahsoka grins. _

_ “Language!” _

Ahsoka holds them both steady and rolls her eyes as Barriss nods. There’s a wave of apologies, more guilt, happiness, worry. Fear and fury so thick that it feels like she’s walking through mud.

As Barriss lets go, Ahsoka realizes that Barriss isn’t afraid of her. She’s not afraid or angry or bitter towards her. So those emotions have to be her own. A shiver runs down her spine and it has nothing to do with the cold.

She forgot for a moment  **when** they were. It wasn’t a trick, but it cuts all the same.

Barriss turns, her shawl blocks her face, and Ahsoka glares at the tip of her nose until she turns forward again. Barriss probably got the gist of that thought before turning them down a series of back alleys. Whatever her response is, it’s blocked by her own swirling negative emotions. Ahsoka can feel her shoulders tensing up the longer it takes, without the past dogging her every step it’s a lot easier to be on edge. She’s about ready to demand to know where they’re going when Barriss stops so suddenly, Ahsoka nearly knocks into her.

“Here,” Barriss turns and thrusts her shawl into Ahsoka’s hands. “We’ll need to take a few more exposed routes.”

“And this is for?” Ahsoka wonders if she’s supposed to cover her face or something when she catches Barriss’s dry stare.

“You don’t have a hood.”

Something warms in her chest, sending tingles up her sides even as a pit forms in her stomach. Of course she remembered, Barriss has a near photographic memory. The thought doesn’t settle well as she thinks of the way Rex hadn’t noticed the problem as he helped her pack for this trip.

They wind their way far more quickly through the streets, and while the shawl does nothing for the cold Ahsoka is glad she can ‘see’ straight again.

Barriss eventually leads them to one of the squat single story homes that are jammed together so tightly that Ahsoka half assumes it’s a Coruscanti design. The door closes and leaves both of them shivering and dripping water in a cramped entryway. Ahsoka gives a quick pulse with the Force to check for other lifesigns.

It’s an automatic response these days but still terribly foolish under the circumstances.

There’s a flash of days blurring past her eyes. Barriss lives alone, she mixes medicines from herbs and seals them in little tins to be made into tea or broth. The candles burn down so quickly it takes her a moment to realize she just saw them from Barriss’s memory, back when they were tall and new.

Ahsoka pinches the bridge of her nose as she works to seal off the section of her mind with the bond. They simply can’t go on without a barrier there. For a moment, she's not sure how in the world they used to function like this.

_ “Of course! Barriss what is going on?” Ahsoka jerks her hand back as Barriss glares at her. _

_ “You are so, so willfully blind!” Barriss isn’t shouting. Barriss doesn’t shout but it’s a near thing. _

_ “What, are you saying you’re going to break my trust?” _

_ “No! Yes! I don’t know! This isn’t-” Barriss taps at the side of her head and it’s like someone’s dumped a bucket of ice water over her. _

_ It hurts. _

_ “Nothing’s stopping you,” Ahsoka hisses. It’s a challenge, a demand, a plea. _

_ Then it’s suddenly silent. It’s so quiet and her whole body feels numb. Barriss tenses, looking almost as shocked at herself as Ahsoka feels. Barriss lifts a shaking hand to her forehead, eyes slipping closed, and the world is on  _ ** _fire_ ** _ . Ahsoka gasps as the pain slams into her, and watches as Barriss collapses. _

_ Ahsoka doesn’t remember moving but she’s holding Barriss’s too still body and it’s getting harder to breath through the pain. It’s so quiet in her mind. The spot Barriss had occupied for so long dark and silent. She did it. Ahsoka gave her permission and she actually did it. _

_ What happens when someone breaks a bond like that? She can’t tell the healers, because they’ll know and Barriss will get in so much trouble. Ahsoka always knew she was going to cause Barriss problems, that this wouldn’t last because Barriss was a good Jedi...she just thought she’d have more time. _

Ahsoka wakes on the floor, her wet outer clothes are off and drying over a radiator of some kind and she’s covered with a blanket. She tilts her head, pressing her montrals into the earthen floor. Barriss is in another room, not pacing but tapping a foot anyways. Her nose helps her realize it must be a kitchen because something smells fantastic. So much for her keen predator instincts she thinks sardonically, smell only kicking when her stomach demands it. Ahsoka slowly stands unwilling to pass out a second time and probes at the shielding she’d started making. It’s blasted away and to bits, outward, as if something in her shattered it completely. Ahsoka grumbles softly as she folds up the blanket, “Great, my own subconscious hates me.”

“Shall I leave you two alone then?” Barriss asks. She’s smiling awkwardly holding two little bowls of whatever smells amazing. Her voice is strained and everything about her screams discomfort.

It’s knowing that Barriss is trying to put her at ease that finally relaxes Ahsoka.

“Oh no, it’s an old argument at this point. That smells like the best soup I haven’t had the chance to eat yet.” It’s just as stilted coming from her. The two of them trying desperately to act as if there’s nothing unusual about this. Like there’s nothing they need to address. Ahsoka follows her to sit at a cramped table and immediately smacks her knees into it’s unforgiving legs.

Barriss, at least, seems to find it amusing. “You’ve gotten very tall.”

“Maybe everything’s just made small, ever think about that?” When she doesn’t get an answer Ahsoka attends to her meal instead. There’s cheese melted on top of a clear dark broth, it’s not got much in the way of substance but Ahsoka has a feeling that’s on purpose. Stupid healers. “How long was I out?”

“Not long.”

It sounds like a tin can hitting a wall when Barriss lies. Soft but jarring all at once. Ahsoka rolls her eyes and struggles to find an easy conversation topic as Barriss winces and shrinks into her seat. When her brain keeps unhelpfully suggesting she start with ‘You betrayed me, the Alliance needs more Jedi, even traitors, and I think I still love you but if you ever touch me again I will chop your fucking hand off’, well, Ahsoka decides to keep her mouth shut. 

She belatedly hopes that Barriss didn’t catch any of that.

The meal is eaten in complete silence and it doesn’t last nearly long enough, even with Ahsoka’s second serving. When Barriss takes her little bowl to the sink there’s a soft edge to the world, a deep fondness and an aching longing. Ahsoka bites her lip and is forced to admit to herself, the bond is nearly finished reforming. That warm, fuzzy feeling is from her. She feels like a tooka cat chasing its own tail. Feel good, then feel bad about feeling good, think about what could’ve gone different, get nostalgic for the past, feel good. Rinse, wash, repeat. She lets herself wallow in her own self pity for exactly one minute before forcing herself into the kitchen.

Barriss is hunched over the sink and looks about as excited for this conversation as Ahsoka feels.

“I didn’t know it was you.” Ahsoka wants to make this point clear. “I heard there was a Jedi here, but when I watched the vid…”

Barriss has frozen solid, heart rate picking up and breathing going shallow. The two cause a strange pounding, grating sound. “The what?”

Ahsoka swallows, glares at her feet, then Barriss’s shoulder, and settles on glaring at the chrono on the wall. “I’m an agent of the Rebel Alliance, part of my duties involves finding Jedi before the Empire and recruiting them to our cause.”

When Barriss fully turns around there is a look of such pain and regret that Ahsoka flinches. “You never stopped fighting?”

“I tried running for a bit. Turns out I’m terrible at it and was ruining everything in my life. Besides, there’s always something worth fighting for.”

She doesn’t want Barriss’s pity, but apparently she has it anyways. She forces her anger at that down, something to deal with later.

“The point,” Ahsoka forges ahead, desperate to get this over with, “is that I’m here to recruit you. We have many positions someone with your skills could fill. Honestly we could really use a healer or tactician, you don’t have to fight.”

Why did she say that? Ahsoka wants to throttle herself for trying to comfort or placate. This is still Barriss Offee. She doesn’t  **want** her to join the Rebellion anyways.

Barriss’s look finally turns inward and shrewd. “I see. This Alliance would just take me on despite what I’ve done? Seems desperate.”

“We are.” Ahsoka forces her jaw to unclench, to speak those two words clearly. “Besides, you’d be working with Separatists, former Imps, double agents and more. Things like being a traitor to the Order or the Republic don’t really matter anymore.”

“Who would my handler be?”

Ahsoka hates to admit she’s shocked by the response. She’d expect, no, hoped that Barriss would say no and that would be that. Thanks for the soup, don’t ever talk to me again. Life’s never that simple.

“Most likely me.”

Barriss seems surprised by that, and leans against the edge of the sink. She seems thoughtful, obviously thinking about the consequences of that particular power structure. There’s a small tentative knock over the bond and Ahsoka shudders even as her heart flutters at that old familiar sensation. She doesn’t open her end though. Apparently unhappy with the response, Barriss pushes off from the sink quickly striding until she’s standing in Ahsoka’s space. She refuses to back down and give ground a second time. After all the years of nightmares and questioning, Ahsoka is tired of being so afraid of someone. She doesn’t have the energy to hold onto all her intense emotions like this, and so Ahsoka slowly reaches into the Force and lets them go.

Barriss eyes flutter shut and the bond flexes.

Ahsoka reaches out to it.

_ Ahsoka is standing several meters away, laughing with some of the troopers. Barriss hesitates for a moment. She doesn’t want to interrupt them, but she’d been so excited that they could finally meet again face to face… _

_ Ahsoka’s head tilts adorably to the side before her friend turns and sees her. Barriss smiles as Ahsoka gives a hearty wave, bidding the men farewell before nearly running over to her. _

_ Barriss’s heart kicks as Ahsoka tackle hugs her. It’s like someone pushes open a door Barriss has been trying to pull on instead. Oh. So this is love. _

There’s a quick lurching pull, trying to drag her in deeper, past that moment, but Ahsoka doesn’t need it. She pushes deeper.

_ Barriss stares at her comm in mute horror. Somehow she was oblivious to Ahsoka’s plight (lies, lies, lies, she ignored the world, she locked herself away after setting her up-) and now she has to end this. End it now. She can still save the Order and she can’t let Ahsoka stop her. Barriss has to let go of her attachments if she is going to save the Jedi. She has to finally rise above her own selfish emotions. _

_ Barriss never deserved the love Ahsoka had to give, and neither of them had the right to feel love at all. _

_ It’s not right. Ahsoka is so full of compassion, and it’s wrong the way she should hide it. It’s disgusting! The one person in this hellish place that deserves the very best, and she doesn’t even realize the abuse the Order has heaped on her. It cuts Barriss to the bone. _

_ (Then save her.) _

_ If Ahsoka is caught now, she’ll be sentenced and the Order will send her away from them and their war. Barriss could break her out of that prison. They could flee together. _

_ (Save her.) _

_ Barriss knows what she has to do. To show Ahsoka the corruption, to save her from the Order, and to save them both from the violence of the war. She just has to be brave. For once in her life she just needs to be  _ ** _brave enough_ ** _ . _

“I was wrong. Nothing can ever change how wrong I was...” Barriss finally steps back. There’s no plea for mercy or forgiveness, not even for understanding. As if showing this one thing has eased something in her.

Ahsoka snarls and floods the bond with every ounce of pain and hate and betrayal she has. It passes as quickly as it starts and leaves her hunched over while Barriss still stands tall. It isn’t  **fair.** But she’s too tired and too worn out. Ahsoka wishes she could rage against her all night. Hells, for all time! No one, not even Barriss, would begrudge her this anger. This one poisonous thing, letting its vines grow through her body. Thorns that tear and cut at her flesh. Bright yellow flowers choking her lungs. She wants to tend to it even as she steps back and watches it dissolve.

Because she’s never been good at staying angry, especially not with Barriss.

“You should have talked to me.” Ahsoka whispers hoarsely as she fights off the stinging of tears in her eyes.

“Yes.” Barriss says it with a heavy finality. Like a knife biting into wood.

And Ahsoka can’t help but feel pathetic as she stands in her ex-girlfriend’s kitchen, hunched over in near physical pain but so grateful that Barriss is still alive after all this time. That she admitted she was wrong. That she wishes she hadn’t done it. What does she want? Ahsoka slowly rights herself and stares at Barriss’s ashen face.

“You  **could** have talked to me.” Ahsoka isn’t sure what she’s pleading for.

Barriss’s gaze drops to the floor, one hand over her mouth.

The bond is still and silent once more.

The words leave her mouth before she knows what she wants. “Will you...?”

“Do you want me to join?” Barriss is tense, speaking to the floor with a blank face and clearly nowhere near reality.

Ahsoka hesitates until her emotions finally snap into place. She can’t hate Barriss. She can’t forgive her. She can be dissapointed. But...but Ahsoka wants Barriss to be happy. She’s an idiot. This can’t be healthy right? It’s like wishing Palpatine well isn’t it? Ok, maybe not that dramatic. Still.

“Not if it hurts you. But, I...I wouldn’t mind.”

At a loss for what else she can do, Ahsoka walks forward and reaches out to cup Barriss’s face between her hands. She send all of it. All of it.

_ Ahsoka opens her eyes to the deep purple blue twilight around them. It’s not a memory. Something whispers too soft for her to hear and Barriss squeezes her hand tight. Comet tails streak overhead as they both turn their faces up to watch. It’s all there. In the sky in space in the ground under their feet. It flows through them like water through a sieve. It’s dangerous, still dangerous, but safe too. Comfortable almost. Sharing every emotions and thought and their souls so close. _

“When do I start?” Barriss’s voice is soft, but the strength that’s been missing seeps into the edges of each syllable.

Ahsoka can feel the violent smirk stretching across her face. Excitement bubbling just below her skin. “Welcome to the Rebellion.”

Barriss rolls her eyes even as she shakes Ahsoka’s hand, something she hadn’t meant to do but it would have been more awkward to retract her empty hand at that point. Ahsoka knows her heart is about to beat out of her chest and she can’t get her face to obey her anymore. She doesn’t much care. Barriss is alive, and here, and she’s joining the fight again. Or medcenter. Whatever. Ahsoka didn’t think this far ahead. Command will want a fighting Jedi, or a public face they can use.  _ Look at us, with powerful allies, the Republic isn’t dead. Suck it Palpatine. _

There’s no way Barriss Offee is going to become the poster child for the Alliance. Her smile doesn’t slip a bit regardless.

“Right,” Ahsoka nervously crosses her arms over her chest, “so, this is a start immediately sort of thing. Unless you think the weather is going to stop us we need to leave. Now.”

Barriss absently nods, one hand thoughtful cupping her chin as she talks to the floor. “I expected as much. If you could get a holo of me, the Empire definitely has it. I’m not a priority though, not like…”

Ahsoka is pretty sure that hearing those words shouldn’t send a little flare of pride through her. Barriss admonishing glare is so familiar that she can’t hold back a small amused snort.

“I swear you are far too much like-”

If Barriss says one damned thing about Anakin this cosmic Force goodwill is going to dry up fast.

“-Master Kenobi. Your whole line is a bunch of restless adrenaline junkies. Give me an hour to pack.” And just like that Barriss is off with a healthy dose of determination and confidence that’s been missing since the alleyway. Hell, since Ahsoka first met her.

Ahsoka stands in the empty kitchen awkwardly, before deciding she can pack up some of Barriss’s food stores.

An hour elapses in the blink of an eye and finds Ahsoka wearing her suspiciously dry and warm outer gear again. Not unconscious long her shebs. She makes it a point to be polite and personable when Barriss stops her to wrap a thick scarf around her head. She definitely doesn’t huff under her breath about how she would have remembered it. She definitely does let loose a string of new curses as the door opens and Ahsoka is forced to remember how kriffing cold and wet and hellish this planet is.

Once they’re out in the open she shuts up and makes sure the scarf pulls up over her mouth and cheeks. She keeps her head down as they pass a squad of patrolling stormtroopers, who are luckily too frozen to care if they are obviously over laden for the late hour. Ahsoka gives it another twenty minutes before someone demands to see exactly what they are hauling in their giant makeshift packs. At least if they’re stopped she has her fake pass and is sure that Barriss must have one too.

Ahsoka prods over the bond to get her attention, voice pitched as soft as possible. “What should I call you?”

Barriss nods absentmindedly as she answers, “Meetra. You?”

“Ashla.”

Ahsoka winks at Barriss’s incredulous look, and quickly shuffles them into the next narrow alley to avoid a much more alert looking group of troopers.

The two duck in and out of back passages, under awnings, and even one store as they make their way back to Ahsoka’s ship. It puts her on edge. Things don’t go this smoothly for her. The Empire isn’t this sloppy. The Force is with them. But why?

As soon as the ramp is closed Ahsoka dashes to the cockpit and runs a scan for tracking devices. She still preps the ship for take off and makes sure to take her time leaving atmosphere. Nothing to make them seem desperate to leave. The diagnostic comes back clean and she punches in the coordinates for a short jump vaguely towards Corellia. There’s no way she isn’t going for a little space walk to make sure for herself. The thoughts must be loud enough for the feeling to bleed through the Force.

Barriss’s amused, “Paranoid much?” scares her more than Ahsoka would like to admit.

Something in her look must be grim enough to give Barriss pause, as she sighs before sitting in the co-pilot's chair. It takes Ahsoka a moment longer than she would have liked to understand why Barriss was holding her hand out, but she takes it when it clicks.

The bond sings to life and a flood of emotions rocket between the two of them so fast it’s disorienting. Ahsoka doesn’t know if she’s apprehensive, worried, tired, or excited. She does, however, know that she’s not confused and therefore some of this isn’t her. She latches onto the emotion, Barriss’s emotion, and pulls lightly until the fears are all out there. Barriss doesn’t want to fight. She doesn’t want to heal either. She does want to heal. Not a battlefield medic though. Not a military medcenter again. 

_ Endless loops of troopers dying, one after the other after the other, all on medical ships and medcenters and places far away from the fighting. They still suffer. They still hurt. They still  _ ** _die_ ** _ and nothing can stem the flow of them. Barriss is treating a symptom, not a cause. She’s trapped healing these men instead of finding a way to save them. It’s reactionary and it grates on her more than she wants to admit. _

Ahsoka hums softly, thoughtfully. It hadn’t occurred to her that Barriss might find her skill to be a curse.

There’s a flash of cynical amusement, and a deep flush of shame. The half formed thought floats with enough substance that Ahsoka gets the gist of it.  _ You never do. _ It whispers and tears at her already fragile heart.

Oh fuck that.

_ Tarkin is hanging by his neck and Ahsoka knows she has to save him, no matter the cost. She does what she’s trained to do and sinks her lightsaber deep into Sobec’s back. Tarkin drops and Ahsoka feels Sobec’s presence in the Force flicker in pain and then disappear. She’s numb as his corpse drops on her, startling her into moving, dropping it to the ground. She killed him. She killed him. _

_ Ahsoka spends time in the halls of healing to help. She needs to do something to actually help. She needs to prove to herself that she is more than her ability to take a life. _

_ (His body was still warm and soft, and when it fell on her it’s surprisingly heavy.) _

Barriss squeezes her hand pulling them back to her ship, and Ahsoka glares her down. The surprise floating down the bond isn’t hers.

The shame doubles, folds, retracts as far back as it can like a spider roach scuttling from the light.

Ahsoka isn’t sure who that belongs to. So she tries again to send information about the Alliance, this much more successfully.

_ The Rebel base is always bustling. Planning, logistics, training, tactics, and more. Atollon, Phoenix Home, Dantooine, Hoth, the Ghost, Yavin-flashes and memories and things that they could use her for. Rebels who need physical therapy as they adjust to new roles off the front lines. Countless intelligence agents crowded around monitors and listening into Imperial transmissions. Civilians desperately in need of training, fighting and first aid and, hell, even cooking. Quartermasters and Flight Deck Officers and Fulcrum agents. _

“It’s...so much bigger than I realized.” Barriss whispers her head tilted down.

Ahsoka is torn between leaning their foreheads together and pulling back. For a split second it’s too much. It’s too personal. She didn’t want to be this close to anyone ever again. She grabs Barriss’s free hand when the other woman tries to pull away. 

Lonely.

She’s been so lonely.

“We’re still smaller than any of us would like at Command. I primarily have been working with individual cells of fighters, trying to fold them into the larger Alliance. It’s alright if you don’t know what you want to do yet, we have time to figure it out.” As each word passes her lips, Ahsoka feels a little lighter. A little stronger. A little better.

She believes in the Alliance, even as she fears they’ll fail. It’s a discordant chord that Ahsoka’s never gotten rid of, never will after the Order.

Barriss nods, her gaze dropping to their hands before looking back up. Pulling on Ahsoka’s conviction and strength to stand taller herself.  _ Give it time. Give me time. I’m not ready. _ “Where will you be while I’m being read in and adjusting?”

Ahsoka gives her a small smile as she lets go. “Working with a Jedi Knight and his Padawan. We’ll be exploring an old Temple for guidance on a sensitive issue.”

She wants to trust Barriss. She does, but she doesn’t yet. So she gives some information, more than she should. Barriss doesn’t need to know about Kanan or Ezra...or Vader. Especially Vader. But this is enough to show she’s trying, surely this is enough?

“There’s more of us?” Barriss voice is thin and reedy, the hope in her eyes unmistakable.

“There are more Jedi than the galaxy knows. Not enough, but more than you’d think.” Ahsoka hedges her bets a little, hoping that she misunderstood what Barriss meant and what the Force affirmed.

The Force thrums with the rightness of it when Barriss closes her eyes and whispers, “Thank the Force, I thought I...”

Ahsoka has owned her title as a non-Jedi, and she isn’t bothered by it. Her status is hers and hers alone, and she forged it along her own path. She has faith in her steps and in the Force, and it was not with the Order. It twists in all the wrong places to realize that for all Barriss found issue with them, that she is still a Jedi. There’s no anger to it, but instead exhaustion. She’s grateful when the alarm beeps and she has a valid excuse to get out of the ship. Barriss doesn’t comment this time when Ahsoka pulls on an emergence space suit.

As she carefully pulls herself around the ship visually checking for a tracking beacon, Ahsoka wonders what it says about her that she lasted all of twenty minutes alone with Barriss before literally jumping out an airlock to avoid her. 

She wonders how much worse it is when she slips back inside Barriss is passed out cold in her seat. Trapped in a ship with someone of questionable morals, heading to places unknown, to do who knows what, to help a vague entity she’s just heard of for the first time, and Barriss is apparently comfortable or exhausted enough to sleep. 

Ahsoka smothers her snickering as Barriss gives one loud snore before somehow slumping further back. A deep sleep. Huh. She carefully picks Barriss up, frowning at how light she is, and moves to lay her carefully in the bunk. Ahsoka rocks back, sitting on her heels and staring. As cute as watching Barriss Offee list bonelessly, snore, and potentially even drool is; it’s concerning.

Ahsoka reaches for the bond, lying to herself about how she isn’t going to use it often. Barriss’s mind feels heavy, but there’s contentment too. It’s hard to imagine Barriss just...drifting for all these years. She’s always been ambitious and focused. To aimlessly wander for so long…

It takes a surprising amount of energy to stand up and return to the cockpit. She quickly punches in a route with multiple short jumps and double backs, the trip to Yavin will take a few days like this but it’s necessary. Her hand hovers over her com unit for a moment before she finally punches in to Alliance Command. She leaves a message for them, short and brief. Ahsoka sighs before turning to catch up on work. There’s no way to warn them that it’s Barriss. There’s no way to fully warn Barriss either. She can only pray this isn’t a mistake.

She can remember, when she was younger, sneaking away with Barriss and feeling the same. Hoping and praying that their love wasn’t a mistake. That Barriss wasn’t wrong to trust her.

It’s kinda funny in retrospect how much she was worried about Barriss trusting her, about Barriss getting in trouble because of her, and most of all her fears that she’d get Barriss kicked out of the Order. Ahsoka smiles grimly at her own reflection. Yeah. Funny.

She’s still hunched over the communications hub when Barriss returns with two mugs in hand hours later. Ahsoka eyes them like they hold the answers to the universe. “You are wonderful.”

“One of these has kaf, the other tea,” Barriss starts with a hesitant grin.

It’s an old game, one they’d come up with when leaving Geonosis. Information in exchange for food or drink, tell the full truth or at least trick the other into thinking it was true and you were rewarded. Lie or fail and the option you didn’t want was the one you had to consume. It was a way for them to get to know one another without having to awkwardly side step around their questions. Ahsoka hasn’t properly slept since the day before she’d landed at Frigore, one extended bought of unconsciousness via Force feedback doesn’t count for much. Really, the game is just cruel at this point even if it’s also kind of funny.

“I take it back, you’re evil, I’m turning this ship around!” Ahsoka turns back to her station and then remembers she isn’t in the pilot’s seat. Damn it. So much for dramatic flair.

“That’s fair,” Barriss says and leans against the wall. There’s a long pause before she sheepishly continues, “I’m not even sure what to ask honestly. You said you ran for a while? I take it that wasn’t literal.”

Stars, that is the most bullshit roundabout-! “Actually it was. For the most part. I was with troopers when it all...I had to run from there. Then I planet hopped for a while as a mechanic. I, uh, tried to settle down on a moon; Raada. That almost worked out until the Empire arrived to exploit it. I couldn’t just run from that.”

The mug of kaf makes a soft clicking noise as Barriss set it on the consol next to her.

“I’m sorry to hear it. What happened? If you don’t mind answering that is.”

Ahsoka stares at her mug of kaf instead of at Barriss, unwilling to see the sympathy there.

“I helped found part of the Alliance, went back, killed an Inquisitor, and rescued everyone we could. Raada’s Imperial territory now, prisoners and slaves work the fields.”

There’s a flicker of sorrow in the Force before Barriss locks herself down tight.

Slowly, Ahsoka picks up her kaf and starts to drink it- and she almost spits it back out. The kaf is over creamed and packed with sugar. It’s disgusting and exactly the way she liked it when she was 16.  _ I was a kaf heathen, no wonder Rex refused to make it for me! _

There’s a gentle question over the bond and Ahsoka realizes a second too late that she’s having a fit of exhaustion giggles. Regardless of the dry non-response she flicks to Barriss over the bond, she does spit the kaf back out before she starts cackling. It’s not funny. Not really, but the thought that everything she’d once loved as a teen has turned out to be in bad taste...it’s kinda funny. She half collapses onto her folded arms and snickers into the disgusting mug of sugar water. Barriss’s amusement is almost like being in an echo chamber.

It takes a supreme effort of will to squeak out, “How did I drink this?”

Barriss snorts and sets off another round of laughter. When a slim green hand appears to whisk it away, Ahsoka manages to twist it out of reach. There’s a slight tugging in the Force, a physical tug against her mug, and Ahsoka decides she’ll drink it like so many other bad drinks she’s had. Slamming it down as fast as possible.

“I do hope you’re proud of yourself.” Barriss huffs, but she’s clearly amused and not focusing on Ahsoka’s past. Victory.

Her stomach gurgles in protest and her eyes nearly water. “I regret everything. But I also don’t have enough kaf to dump a cup!”

Barriss tilts her head and squints, it’s that calculating healer look that Ahsoka is re-learning to loath.

“How much sleep did you get?”

Ahsoka snorts, “When?”

There’s a long pause as Barriss frowns at her. “Last night. It’s nearly 08:00.”

Twisting back around, Ahsoka declutters her workstation and glares at the chrono which blinks back steadily at her 07:52. Her exhaustion hits her like a two ton block. She can’t go to sleep now, not with all the little jumps in the next few hours. “Well kriff, I’ll get some sleep after the nav corrections. And stop death glaring me I lost track of the time alright?”

“Whatever for?” Barriss’s voice is a little terse, as if she can judge Ahsoka for doing her job.

It makes her snap back, “You don’t have the clearance.”

There’s a gentle swell in their bond, and while Ahsoka tries to ignore it, she’s still shocked when it washes over her with soothing whispers and cool tones. She slumps in relief into her chair before grumbling at her work. Her stomach gurgles unhappily as if offended to have been left out.  _ Wow, never drinking kaf like that again _ .

“Alright, then tell me the jumps and you get some sleep.”

Ahsoka rolls her eyes wanting to refute the point, but Barriss cuts her off. “You’ve already shown me all the major bases, it’s not like I don’t know where they are. I just don’t know the route you planned.”

Her stomach twists at the thought, Ahsoka hasn’t messed up like that in a long damn time and it’s embarrassing and worrying that she did. Barriss sighs pulling her presence in the Force back slightly even as she squeezes Ahsoka’s shoulder. 

Barriss’s thoughts still drift to reach her, clear as if she was speaking them, “ _ If I was going to do something nefarious I would have done it in the comfort of my own home. _ ”

Ahsoka wants to argue. She wants to fight back that she’s fully justified to be worried. That she’s been operating on her own. That she shouldn’t just give up intel like that to anyone. But it’s all unfounded. Barriss has had plenty of opportunity to kill her, and Ahsoka has had plenty of chances to do the same. Still, she can’t fully unstick her tongue to admit any of it. She hesitantly reaches for their bond, touching it even as she’s unsure what to say. But it pulls a memory up it shouldn’t.

_ The darkness is overwhelming, it’s drowning her. It’s clawing through her veins and burning so hot Ahsoka thinks she might die. It feels like the Son. It hurts and it’s so achingly familiar just under the surface- _

Ahsoka lurches to her feet, breathing ragged as she blasts random noise down the bond. Drowning out the memory as best she can. No one can know about Vader. No one. Barriss grabs her arm, as if to stabilize her and Ahsoka flinches-

_ The binders are so tight that she’s losing feeling in her arms. It’s really not a pressing concern yet. Ahsoka’s whole body jerks with the Force of the punch. It’s easier to focus on than the alternative. _

_ “You will tell us where your base is Rebel scum.” _

_ She hates that prickly, tingly feeling in her fingers. She also hates the sluggish dripping feeling from her bloody nose. She also  _ ** _really_ ** _ hates this two credit, two faced schutta! For all that her voice is a weak whisper she manages to sound confident if she does say so herself. “Rather not thanks.” _

_ The ARC focuses the next several hits to her lek, and Ahsoka can’t lean far enough forward to vomit without it covering her front. She tries to concentrate on the binders instead of the warm slick sick on her chest. _

She wrenches her arm back, and spins to punch the bulkhead. Better that than Barriss. A broken hand is better than hitting Barriss. The two of them were just making up and honestly blood will  **never** come out of the seat’s upholstery. She’s not even mad with Barriss, she’s not, but suddenly Ahsoka is falling down a karking hole of trauma she doesn’t want anyone to know let alone her kriffing ex. If only willing it away would actually work.

There’s another wave of soothing cool compresses, feather blankets, faint incense all over their bond. Barriss wants her to reach out to the bond. To ground and focus using it and Ahsoka can feel her skin crawling. She doesn’t want to. She-

_ -doesn’t want to, but it’s their lives at stake. Ahsoka tries to lock it down, to keep her emotions out of the killing the way she was trained to. It helps to have Rex there, the steady blast of his decees at her side helps make this feel...less like a fever dream if nothing else.  _

_ She wishes it was. _

_ Grip jerks as she deflects the bolts back into him. Ahsoka didn’t know Grip well, but he’d fawned over being assigned to the 501st and laughed at every bad joke she thought up regarding his name. _

_ Sarge howls, his voice crackling through the speakers, “Traitor!” _

_ Ahsoka easily dodges his clumsy attack and stabs him through the chest. She can’t just disable them. They’ll find other Jedi. She can’t let them hurt anyone else! _

_ Her heart aches. She really doesn’t want to. _

“Stop it! Stop it!” Ahsoka chokes, half collapsing into the wall and desperate to get away. Her mind spinning too fast to really process what’s happening. 

But the soothing waves stop, the bonds falls silent, and Ahsoka is finally able to fucking breath.

“I...understand. Not what you’ve been through, but why you might be scared to sleep.” Barriss’s voice is soft and awkward. Ahsoka shudders and forces herself to not hyperventilate. Just barely managing to slowly suck a shaking lungful of air in and let it out over and over as Barriss speaks. “I promise you, I swear to you that I won’t do anything while you sleep. Because you  **need** to sleep. We can drift for a while so you don’t have to tell me the route.”

Ahsoka doesn’t like the way Barriss sounds like she’s talking to cornered animal, even if she is still shaking and breathless on the ground. She’s not worried about Barriss trying anything. She’s not. Right? It feels like a ton of bricks when Ahsoka realizes that she is nervous. Ok, so maybe she’s anxious about this. She is anxious about this. This is causing stress. Why is this causing stress?  _ Why does everyone try to stab me in the back? _ Oh. Well. There’s that. Ah.

What a stupid thing to think. What a foolish thing to have a break down over here when Barriss has proven herself. When Ahsoka saw deep into her soul not even a day before and felt like she was alive for the first time in her life.

She sits there in silence for a long while, waiting until the panic recedes in the face of exhaustion, before pushing herself up onto her shaking legs. Her eyelids droop and she suppresses a yawn, not even jumping when the shrill warning alarm goes off. Barriss pulls the lever softly taking them out of the hyperlane and Ahsoka focuses. 

She opens the bond to find Barriss waiting on the other side. After forcing her melatonin headache to stop taking over she sends the jump coordinates. Painstakingly one by one, the feeling of her hands moving to punch it into her ship, the different tones as she presses the buttons, all towards safety. Towards Yavin base and Alliance command. Her wariness of their reception slips through at the last moment before Ahsoka mumbles, “Right, bed. Good talk.”

She doesn’t wake for the rest of the trip.

Barriss is nervously prodding at her, painstakingly forcing her back up and out of her dreamless sleep. The exchange of time and day, and the shock at having slept for more than a handful of hours coming and going within seconds. Barriss reminds her of the reason why. Force burnout. Right, Ahsoka was still suffering from that. Her stomach howled with discontent that the last thing she’d consumed was a cup of sad weak baby kaf nearly two days prior.

It takes no longer than fifteen minutes for Ahsoka to use the fresher, change into clean clothes, and be shoving a ration bar into her mouth as she enters the cockpit. Barriss has at least had the foresight to wake her up before they arrived at the base, although it doesn’t stop Ahsoka from glaring at Barriss a little. “Tell me you at least slept at some point?”

“Of course, your route did provide stretches of time for rest.” Barriss nods, only to scowl at Ahsoka’s skeptical look. “Rest as in sleep, I’m not eighteen anymore thanks!”

Eighteen year old Barriss would often speak in double meanings. Getting rest sometimes meaning sleep, sometimes sitting still, sometimes watching people pass thoughtlessly. Eating could mean a meal, a bite, some gum- really Barriss’s ability to lie by telling the truth was nearly as impressive as Obi-Wan’s.

Snorting Ahsoka chuckles, “Amazing the abuses the body can handle.”

It’s an old clone trooper joke, recycled and reused to so many times that it had lost meaning at one point. 

Barriss still grins ruefully before jabbing a finger towards her face, “Shush!”

It’s pleasant in its own weird way. To sit here quietly with a cup of black kaf, the way the Force willed kaf to be, in one hand and Barriss’s hand in the other. They cautiously but earnestly spend their remaining time learning more about what the other has done. Boundaries laid clearly around the topics they don’t wish to share, although Barriss hesitates at the sandy edge leading towards Kanan and Ezra. Ahsoka sends patience down the bond earning a mock temperature check in case she was getting sick. Ahsoka needs to check that they are alright with their identities being shared. She needs to ensure the safety of those she oversees. But Barriss lets it go, content just to know they are out there and alive.

Eventually they stop so that Ahsoka can give her clearance codes. There’s a slight pause to the whole affair as Barriss tries to leave, and Ahsoka nearly gives away her high rank security to a woman with a photographic memory and a soft smile. She soothes herself by remembering that soon enough she doesn’t need to worry about that anymore. Focus on getting in the base first, then she can think about herself.

The shuttle lands, a crew already scrambling to fuel her up, mechanics begin diagnostics and droids roll about scanning for trackers.

Barriss flinches at the activity, drawing closer to Ahsoka’s hooded form. It isn’t until Ahsoka puts her hand on Barriss’s shoulder that the reason for that comes through.    
  
_ The fear, fear, guilt, failure, acceptance of knowing she’ll be recognized. She said yes, and Barriss meant yes. She wants to help. She wants to help Ahsoka. She wants Ahsoka. Someone will recognize her any moment and kill her and Barriss will deserve it. There’s so many of them, there’s so many variables, how does anyone keep track? _

Ahsoka sends her own calming waves, pulling Barriss around the hallways until she tucks them into a small closet. A place where Barriss wheezes for breath, her head pressed into the crook of Ahsoka’s neck as she fights through wave after wave of deep anxiety. The bond has closed on her side and Ahsoka can’t help but feel a little guilty that this is what Barriss was experiencing during her own recent breakdown. It feels awful. She feels useless waiting like this, as if she were being callous instead of trying to be kind. When Barriss leans back again she looks clamer, and she must have made a face because Barriss grabs her hand.

_ Fear, still fear. But also conviction. Also drive. Also desire and longing. _

“Just gotta fall forward,” Ahsoka chuckles softly and earns a swat to the arm for her efforts. “Oh so it’s okay when you say it, but when  **I** say it-”

“Hush!” Barriss grumbles, but she’s starting to smile a bit herself. “I am older and wiser, and how dare you throw my words back at me. I am currently being traumatized!”

The Force rings true with it, but Ahsoka has long learned to roll with humor in arguably bad taste.

So she puts on her sleaziest smile, cocking a hip out as she slides her arms around Barriss’s neck. “I know, being trapped in a closet with me in kissing range and not kissing me? The worst.”

The bond faintly sounds like a bomb has gone off and Ahsoka only laughs until Barriss punches her stomach hard enough to nearly wind her. After that she dissolves into giggles and takes Barriss down with her. Both of them laughing harder and louder than they should. Stars, if anyone opened that door they’d be terrified. Two Force users, who have clearly lost their minds, gasping for air and desperately wiping away tears. The nerves and the fears and the hurts and the anger bleeding away bit by bit until they’re both leaning against the wall for support. Bail is going to be annoyed that they’re late. Ahsoka snorts as she pictures his face, the little furrow in his brow nearly sets her off again. Barriss waves her hand, apparently having caught part of that, before pulling them both back into the corridor.

Five minutes later no one would be able to guess what absolute wrecks of sentient beings they both are.

They enter Yavin’s command room, and Ahsoka walks Barriss over to the secluded area where Mon Mothma and Bail Organa are bent over a map. Bail looks up first, his relief to see her is palpable. His smile goes soft and warm before his eyes flick over to Barriss, and the whole thing freezes up. Mon Looks at them both with the same calculating look before speaking. 

“I see you did find a Jedi.”

“Yes,” Ahsoka nods, she takes a half step to turn and look at Barriss with them. “Jedi Knight Barriss Offee has agreed to help the Rebellion with a few stipulations.”

She lets the two of them look at each other before looking back at her, but Ahsoka motions towards Barriss again. Taking the hint, Barriss clears her throat, “I am not a fighter and I cannot be at a medcenter treating patients long term. That said, I can teach others to heal.”

Ahsoka is sure she hid her surprise, but the way the bond wobbles lets her know she didn’t. Was that always so loud? Ahsoka could have sworn it used to not make any noise until they touched. She keeps the frown off her face. Something else to try and learn about, near broken Force bonds being remade. Maybe they’re different?

“You were a healer?” Mon asks, one eyebrow twitching.

“Yes, I received my medical license when I was fifteen. I served at several medcenters during the war and at three of those I was the head medic, and one of those was set up specifically for me to help oversee the training of young clone medical officers.”

Should she feel that proud of someone who murdered people in the name of making a point? Ahsoka’s heart does a strange two kick and hates it. She’s decided to move forward  **with** Barriss. Now is not the time to be questioning. She already questioned, found answers, was given a window into a person’s soul, and found no problem. She needs to stop pulling up the worst thing when Barriss talks about something good she has done.

She really does need to talk with a healer after this. Ahsoka crosses her arms as she pulls herself back into the conversation. She can’t keep letting her emotions pull her away from reality like this.

“And what do you think Ahsoka?” Bail looks at her expectantly and Ahsoka feels like an idiot two feet tall.

Barriss pushes the question over the bond.

“I searched within her using the Force, Barriss’s desires are genuine.” She decides to keep the part about them being partially directed at impressing her out of the answer. 

Bail frowns, brow furrowing as her rubs at his mouth. Ahsoka snorts and manages to pass it off as a sneeze, narrowly dodging a fit of inappropriate giggles. “Then it’s decided. Welcome to the Rebellion Knight Offee.”

The meeting wraps quickly enough only for Bail to drop a test of her endorsement for Barriss directly on her head. “Where are you off to next Fulcrum?”

Blasted paranoia. “Lothal, Phoenix Squadron needs me. You should hear from me within a week.”

“You’re not staying?” Barriss blurts her question out, coloring with embarrassment at speaking out of turn even as she trembles slightly.

Ahsoka winces. Kriff. “Not this time, but I will be back in a week. We can talk more then.”

There’s a moment of panic before the resolve takes it again. Acceptance through pain. Ahsoka sends her own apology, as weak as it is, over and is grateful it’s accepted. A quick nod to Mon and Bail, and in a last second decision, a formal bow to Barriss (the kind a much younger her would have laughed herself to tears over) and Ahsoka leaves. The further she walks the more reality returns and weighs down on her shoulders. Strange. No matter how many times she didn’t want Barriss there, no matter how concerned she was, leaving her behind feels desperately wrong. She doesn’t hesitate or pause as she returns to her ship, plugging in the coordinates and compartmentalizing her plans.

Meet up with Phoenix Home. Transfer to the Ghost. Go to the Temple on Lothal. Follow the path. Always follow the path wherever it may lead. Her stomach twists as Vader’s mechanical wheezing plays in her mind.

Follow the path, and blaze your own trail if necessary. Advice from her Master that has kept her moral compass in tact.

Ahsoka breathes out as the shuttle jumps to hyperspace. Breathes in. Breathes out. The bond hums quietly in the back of her head, growing fainter with every minute. Still, it’s reassuring and comforting. Barriss came back. She came back from darkness on her own and back to herself with a little help from someone who cares about her. Breathe in. Breathe out. 

Perhaps Anakin could use the same?

**Author's Note:**

> Original Prompt:  
Request by AriesOnMars  
Fandom:Star Wars - All Media Types 
> 
> Prompts:  
1.) Stolen moments, set during TCW where Ahsoka and Barriss finds times to be alone together and to be affectionate even if it's not how a Jedi should act.  
2.) Everything changes, during SWR timeline with Ahsoka as Fulcrum, Barriss is alive and hiding from the Empire, not even sure herself if her life is in danger or not after what she did. The rebellion needs help and she can do it, if Ahsoka can bring herself to see her old friend and forgive her. That's not easy with the knowledge that on some level Barriss was right, her actions were wrong, but the Jedi were unknowingly helping to bring forth something terrible.
> 
> Faves:  
1.) Connection through the Force, the ability to share intimate thoughts and feelings with each other, either romantic or sexual, but not necessarily requiring physical contact beyond small touches.  
2.) Focus on tattoos and markings, especially on the face.  
3.) Inhuman biology for both characters, things like over exaggerating Ahsoka's purely carnivorous diet. I don't have any set preference for this, I just like when people get creative, even if it's not exactly canonical.


End file.
